Dropbox snaps up Audiogalaxy music streaming service

Dropbox has bought Seattle-based music streaming startup Audiogalaxy for an undisclosed sum, it has been announced. This timing of the acquisition has inspired speculation about the data storage firm's possible interest in building a new cloud music platform.

Audiogalaxy, which has apps for both iOS and Android, appears to have moved its operations to its new parent company, as it is no longer accepting new signups and has said the last day for users to access Mixes will be 31 December.

“Today, we are thrilled to announce our team is joining Dropbox! We are excited about the opportunity to join the amazing folks at Dropbox and bring great new experiences to100M+ Dropbox users,” Audiogalaxy wrote in a post on its website.

Co-founders Tom Kleinpeter, Viraj Mody and Michael Merhej launched the current iteration of Audiogalaxy in 2008, reimagining it as a music sharing platform akin to Spotify, while the original incarnation of the service operated as a peer-to-peer file-sharing service.

Dropbox may be looking to offer stronger content streaming functionality as a means of keeping in step with rival cloud storage platforms like Amazon’s Cloud Drive, Google Drive and Microsoft’s SkyDrive, all of which boast stronger media applications and a dedicated ecosystem of platforms.